It's Not Really Acting If The Feelings Are Already
by Stacey89
Summary: Troypay. What happens when two completely different people get the leads in the play.. will they get on or will it all fall down around them
1. Intro and Chapter 1

Intro.

Whenever Sharpay Evans walked down the hall there was always that one split second that her "Ice Queen" façade nearly broke. She couldn't help it though he just melted her heart and made her feel completely helpless with a simple glance, but of course this happened to almost every girl that he walked past. She had never told anybody about it though, not even her twin brother, she felt stupid for having these thoughts because she knew that nobody as popular and caring as him would ever consider having feelings for her since she was the biggest bitch in school to most people. Little did she know that every time Troy Bolton passed her in the hallway he wished he could talk to her without his friends thinking he had gone crazy, or possibly losing his head when she did her bitch thing.

This had been going on since middle school when they had first come across one another. He was already sitting in his chair when she walked into class, the teacher had assigned the class to chairs, she was seated behind him and he had caught her eye straight away and she had caught his attention as soon as she had stepped into the doorway but neither of them had the courage to talk to each other back then and now… well things had changed and it seemed to both as though they probably never would get to talk.

However things changed when the girl Troy had sang with at the New Year party he attended started their school after the winter break. He managed to get her to try out for the next school production with him and used this as his opportunity and excuse to talk to Sharpay. This plan was going well until Sharpay decided to keep up appearances and keep "Troy the basketball boy" out of the production as they had to save it from "those who don't know the difference between a Tony award and Tony Hawke." But she eventually backed down and she and Troy ended up with the leads in the play which of course shocked the whole school on two levels. 1. Troy was in the school drama production and 2. Troy and Sharpay would be working and spending time together.

Rehearsals day one.

Sharpay's p.o.v.

God I love this place when it's empty, so much time to think, prepare myself for the day ahead and get into my "ice queen" character. It's getting so much harder to keep this façade up just being around him all the time is making me want to scream how happy I am from the rooftops. Oh there goes the door opening guess I better get my guard up.

Nobody's p.o.v.

"Hey sis."

"Oh hey Ryan. Sorry I left this morning I just needed time to reflect and get my thoughts in order."

"Oh don't worry about it. I enjoyed the fresh air when I walked today. You know you could just ask him to run lines outside of school with you to make sure you can work together to the standard that you're used to working to."

"I guess, but you know how up in arms the school is about us working together inside hours can you imagine if they found out we were spending time together outside of school too. Then I really would be the most hated girl in school, not just the bitchiest. It seems like you really are the only person I can trust in this school enough to talk to properly. Oh by the way… how long have you known? 'cause I didn't tell you."

"Shar, I know you better than anyone, I can just tell."

"Shhhh Ryan, somebody's coming through the door, they can't hear what we were just talking about."

"Well I'm off anyway, I gotta go talk to my math teacher before class, see you second period."

"Bye Ry."

In the distance Sharpay can hear Ryan saying "Hey Troy, see ya later."

'Oh man, I hope he didn't hear any of that conversation.'

"Oh hi Sharpay, I'm glad you're here, you're just the person I was looking for. Do you mind if we go over our lines together at some point, just me and you, there are some bits I'm not comfortable with and I really don't wanna make an ass of myself."

"Sure Troy, whenever suits you best is fine with me."

"Cool, how about today after rehearsals… I have two free periods… Is that okay with you?"

"Hang on two seconds" Sharpay checked her school schedule, "Actually Troy I have History second period but I'm free third period and lunch hour if you wanna go over lines then instead"

"That's probably better for me, that way I can still go to free period basketball practice… I think the guys are getting a little annoyed with me. Are you coming to Homeroom?"

"Not right now, I'll be along in a few minutes" 'Darn Sharpay, why'd you have to go an say that, now he's goin to think there's some reason you don't wanna be seen with him'

Ms Darbus' Homeroom.

Sharpay made it to homeroom just before the bell rang which was lucky, even if she was the star of most of the school plays Darbus would still give her detention without hesitation.

Sharpay, once she had sat down, could hear someone trying to get her attention by whispering he name.

When she turned around she was greeted by Troy for the second time that day.

"Do you mind coming over to my house to rehearse after school as well please? I think I'm gonna need all the help and practice you can give me, I didn't realise how many lines I had"

Sharpay couldn't help but laugh at his cuteness when he said this. "Sure Troy, I'll see you at my locker after last period."

"Quiet now Bolton and Evans, this is homeroom not socialising time."

And oddly in unison they both said "Sorry, Ms Darbus"

At the end of homeroom the classroom emptied very quickly and Sharpay made her way to first period Science.

On entering the classroom she could already feel Gabriella pulling evils looks in her direction, which she still didn't quite understand. As far as she knew she hadn't done anything wrong to Gabriella. In any case she didn't really care, it was her who was spending most of today with Troy and nobody could bring her down from that.

Troy's P.O.V.

'Hmm, hope my little bro left the house tidy when he left for school today.'

He felt himself bump into somebody on the way into Math so stopped to say sorry. He was then greeted by, "Don't worry bout it Troy."

"Hey Ryan, did you get your issues with our teacher fixed?"

"No not really, I guess he just doesn't like me, but I don't really care. Have you spoken to Sharpay today? She seemed quite distracted when I spoke to her this morning."

"Yeah I have. She seemed fine to me. I'll see if I can get it out of her later when she helps me go over my lines if you want though."

"Yeah, thanks dude. She doesn't really talk to me as much as she used to, seems like she's even turning her 'ice queen' attitude towards me."

"I'm sure it's nothing Ryan, maybe she's just feeling down."

"Boy's, shut up."


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2.

Third period seemed to take a lifetime to arrive for the two teens. But eventually the time for them to rehearse together rolled around. At the end of second period Sharpay strolled towards her locker to put her books away and also to collect her script…. Just so she could check Troy's line were correct of course. When she reached her locker she was shocked to see Troy already standing there waiting for her so she said, "Er, Troy, how come you're standing outside my locker… aren't you of all people worried what the rest of East High will say when they see you here?"

"Nah, they know I'm in the play so most of them will know why I'm here, to talk about the play."

"True enough. Well Darbus is teaching in the theatre at the moment so where do you wanna go to practice?"

"How about up to the science gardens?"

"Wow, you never fail to amaze me, first superstar basketball player, then singer/actor and now… you actually know where the science gardens are. I must admit I'm impressed."

"Ha ha. Don't be nasty about it, would you rather we didn't practice, then your little show would be rubbish." Troy said sticking his tongue out at her and turning towards the steps to go up.

"Hey, wait up, you need my help remember." Sharpay yelled after him trying to catch up with him in her shoes.

Once they had reached the top, Sharpay decided it was probably safe to drop her guard a little bit since nobody else apart from Troy would see it. "So, where do you wanna start, where are you having the most trouble?" she asked him.

"Well, the worst bit is my monologue. I can't remember that many words. How do you do it?"

"Let's see, it's hard to explain how to do it. But I suppose if you take it a line at a time and learn it line by line they might sink in better. So like this your first line in the monologue is 'Serena, I can't do this anymore, we're lying to everyone about who we are with and somebody's going to end up getting hurt.' Do you think you could learn that first and then we can go over the rest at lunch? I promised Ryan I'd go and talk to him, I think he thinks something's wrong with me because I left without him this morning and was sitting alone in the theatre when he found me."

"Yeah, sure. Theatre at lunch?"

"Of course. You're not getting out of it that easily, you asked for help not you're going to feel the pressure."

"See you in an hour Sharpay."

"Bye, Troy."

He just stood there and watched after her as she left. 'Wow she has a heart and a nice side when she's not cornered, more than just a pretty face, you could fall for her big time Bolton.'

Downstairs in the music room.

Sharpay sat down at the piano, it had been years since she had played but all the same she figured she would tinkle around whilst she was waiting on Ryan.

She the jumped when he cleared his throat behind her, "Oh my God Ryan. You scared the life from me."

"How come you never try to write a musical for school Shar? You know you're good at it."

"I dunno. I guess I worry about letting people see too much of the real me."

"So, what was up with you today?"

"Nothing really, I was just thinking about how hard it's getting to keep up appearances, now that Troy and I are working together on the play. It won't be long until it's obvious to everyone how I feel about him."

"So. That makes you human, I mean in all honesty, what girl at this school hasn't had a crush on Troy at one point or another?"

"That's what worries me. This isn't just a crush, I've had these feelings for so long that I know its not. But people will just think it is."

At that Sharpay broke into tears in her brother's arms.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3.

The twins stayed there in the music room until Sharpay had managed to pull herself together well enough to go to the bathroom to fix her makeup. Once they had finished talking it was almost time for lunch so Sharpay quickly ran to the bathroom and re-glamorised herself and Ryan sauntered off to find Gabriella and the rest of the gang.

After taking one last glimpse in the mirror Sharpay made her way over to the theatre and waited for Troy to join her, which wasn't that long apparently considering that a few seconds after walking into the theatre she heard "Serena, I can't do this anymore, we're lying to everyone about who we are with and somebody's going to end up getting hurt. Maybe we should just come clean. Or maybe we should leave, at least that way we can be together and be left alone, nobody to have an opinion on what we're doing, at least nobody who's opinion we actually care about. Please I can't carry on sneaking around like this, we have to do something."

She responded to this by flipping her long, luxurious, shiny blonde hair behind her shoulder and saying "But I can't just leave my friends and family behind without any explanation. But we can't tell them, they would kill us or worse." Then coming out of character she said "I don't believe you do need help Bolton. I asked you to learn one line not the whole section of dialogue it came from"

"Well, I thought I should try very hard since you might blow up at me or something if I didn't exceed your expectations."

"I must admit I am very, very impressed with your dedication to this. This may go better than I had originally presumed it would."

"Sharpay, you know I will try my best to make this play a success. I mean everything I do I try so hard in and I'm not going to make this any different. It means a lot to me, maybe not as much as it means to you but still I want it to go well. And in order for that to happen I want to make sure that we can play off one another and act well together. Perhaps my approach was a slight lie but it worked, it got you to work with me when I wasn't certain that you would."

"Of course I would have. I was going to ask you to run lines with me privately anyway so that I could see the same for myself. Like you said the play means a lot to me. So lets tick to just running lines instead of you pretending your struggling with yours."

"Deal. So you are still coming round to mine to practice after school?"

"Sure. But can we stop by the diner on the way, I wanna pick something up."

"No problem. We have to drive past it anyway. Are you about ready to leave? I was told on my way here that our last period isn't happening today."

"Cool. Let me just go find Ryan and let him know that I definitely won't be giving him a lift home today."

"Or, you could just give him your keys and let him drive your car home and I'll give you a lift."

"Or I could do that. Come on then we still gotta go find him."

After a few minutes they found Ryan and explained to him what was happening. He gladly obliged and took Sharpay's car keys without hesitation. The three teens said their goodbyes to one another and Ryan walked off to Sharpay's silver Audi TT with the convertible roof as Troy and Sharpay walked to Troy's Jeep.

As he had promised Troy stopped at the diner so that Sharpay could go and collect whatever it was that she needed. Through the window he saw her stop at the counter and say something to the waitress before the waitress handed her a white envelope. He then saw her quickly stuff the envelope into her Gucci bag and stroll out then get back into his car.

"All done. Let's get to your place."

"Okay dokey." He replied then drove on to his house.


End file.
